¶ Swift refers to this pamphlet in his “Roman Catholic Reasons for Repealing the Test.”  It is also noted by the printer of the undated second edition of the London reprint of “The Plea.”

(xii.) “The Dispute Adjusted, about the proper time of applying for a Repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts:  by shewing that no time is proper.  By the Reverend Father in God, Edmund Lord Bishop of London.”

¶ Faulkner, in the second edition of “The Presbyterians’ Plea,” advertises this tract to appear in 1733.  The author of “The Case of the Episcopal Dissenters in Scotland” mentions that it has been “lately re-printed” in Ireland, but that it is “falsely ascribed to the Bishop of London.”

(xiii.) “The Test Act considered in a Political Light.” 1733.  Broadside.

(xiv.) “Queries upon the Demand of the Presbyterians to have the Sacramental Test Repealed at this Session of Parliament.” 1733.  Broadside.

¶ These Queries differ somewhat from those put by Swift in 1732.

(xv.) “A Letter from a Freeman of a certain Burrough, in the North of Ireland, to his Friend and Representative in Parliament; shewing Reasons why the Test Act should not be Repealed.” 1733.  Broadside.

(xvi.)
  “The Grunter’s Request
       To take Off the Test.”
                     [A Poem.] 1733. 12mo.

Scott suggests ("Life of Jonathan Swift,” 1824, p.401) that “probably more occasional tracts” were written by the Dean on the subject of the Test “than have yet been recovered.”  The curious student may satisfy himself on this matter by reading the above pamphlets.  Neither Monck Mason, Dr. Barrett, nor Scott himself, cared to take upon themselves to decide whether any of them were by Swift; nor have any of the Dean’s modern biographers thrown any light on the subject.  A point to note in this consideration is the fact that Faulkner, in his collected edition of Swift’s works, did not include any of these; and, as he himself published many of them, he would certainly have known something of their authorship.

Swift’s agitation against the repeal of the Test was so successful that the Irish House of Commons found itself in a majority for the Test.  In addition to the prose tracts Swift wrote a stinging poem “On the Words Brother Protestants and Fellow Christians,” an expression familiarly used by the advocates for the Repeal of the Test Act.  This poem brought him into personal conflict with one Serjeant Bettesworth, who “openly swore, before many hundreds of people, that upon the first opportunity, by the help of ruffians, he would murder or maim the Dean of St. Patrick’s.”  The lines to which the Serjeant took exception were: 

  “Thus at the bar the booby Bettesworth,
  Though half-a-crown o’erpays his sweat’s worth;
  Who knows in law, nor text, nor margent,
  Calls Singleton his brother serjeant.”